You can’t imagine it, the singer remarks. There she was readying for her new album launch in nearly a decade, deeply enamored with her current love, and finally the parent to a young child after facing fertility challenges for ten years, feeling invincible. Then in March she was told she had a breast cancer diagnosis.
The singer-songwriter, birth name J. Cornish, is renowned for telling it as it is. The album, Don’t Tease Me With a Good Time, was supposed to be an candid account, tackling every ounce of devastation she’d faced since she last made an album (endometrial issues, pregnancy loss, broken romances, emotional abuse, mental health struggles) with her usual frankness. The lead track, her single No Secrets, was dropped in the spring. But by then there was a mighty secret. The cancer. Then next release, her song Living My Best Life, was released in May and Cornish was talking to press about how she was living her best life, while still secretly living with breast cancer. Four weeks after she disclosed her condition, and in early July she underwent breast removal surgery.
She gives me her best “What the fuck?” glance. “I come out with a song called the track No Secrets. I’m conducting every interview, and they’re, like, ‘Any updates?’ and I respond, ‘Well, not much…’” she has just had to cancel tour dates because she’s yet to undergo cosmetic procedures.
We’re at a photo studio in London. She is wearing a tan faux-leather coat, blue jeans with elaborate white patches, off-white boots and big frames. Imagine biker chic meets vintage look. “As if I’m in the seventies and I should have a boyfriend with a big tache.” Easy Rider, I say, referencing the film. “They used to call me that!” She grins. Cornish is quick, unfiltered and blunt. She says she has always fancied doing comedy and is planning to attempt her first comedy performance soon. “I love making people laugh. On stage I frequently joke about the fans.”
Health Struggles and Diagnosis
She was getting ready for an appearance at the ceremony when she discovered a mass. “I quickly sought to get it looked at, had an ultrasound, and they said, ‘It seems benign; your breasts are normal.’ And I insisted, ‘But I can feel it. I’ve got an achy arm and tingling in my hands whenever I rise.’ And they replied, ‘Well, let’s just do a biopsy?’ That was 28 March, the day after my birthday.” It was a weekend eve. The physician told her if it was bad news she’d contact on the start of the week. By then the singer had assured herself it was nothing. The way she explains it, it was just bad timing to face illness when she had so much on.
“It was a fortnight prior from launching this thing after a long hiatus and an extended break. And the doctor messaged and said, ‘Is six okay?’ And I was, like, ‘It’s virtual, probably routine.’ So I jump on the Zoom thinking it’s all going to be good, and she goes, ‘Are you sitting down?.’ You know that sad tone they use? And she says, ‘I regret to inform you but your biopsy results have shown aggressive cancer.’” How did you respond? “I replied, ‘Well, that’s not great. That’s not fucking great timing.’ My initial thought was, ‘I can’t die because my son needs me.’”
I’ve been labeled difficult for knowing myself
She viewed the procedure frightening and surreal. “I dislike anesthesia. They walk you down. During crises you are wheeled, but this time I just marched with a gown on and my bum hanging out. You feel like you’re in an episode of Black Mirror.” But, Cornish says, she’s been fortunate. No chemotherapy or radiation, just the surgery. “Cancer sucks, man, but yet Luckily it was detected early. The surgery happened recently and my right breast now looks like a fruit under fabric.” A further beam. “I got to keep the nipple, though.”
The subsequent surgery is therapeutic and aesthetic. Her boobs, she remarks, are now “uneven. The size doesn’t match. How rude! I reflected, why make it worse, I’m already having a difficult experience. Such disrespect! It’s funny because I said I’d avoid breast surgery because I’ve got obsessive tendencies, and I know they’d never be flawless. My plans were disrupted.”
A History of Health Challenges
The singer is accustomed to medical issues. She thinks her outlook on her diagnosis has been so optimistic because she’s used to medical emergencies. Many times they occur alongside professional successes, functioning as a wake-up call, or shock, to remind her not to take anything for granted. “Truly, I feel the universe whispers, ‘Things going well? Hold on.’ Since childhood, it has often paired with achievements for me; something severe or obscure has happened to my health.”
She reminisces to her youth, already making her debut featuring in the West End in a musical (she was chosen at the age of 9). That’s when she was told about the heart condition Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome, which can cause a tachycardia as well as dizziness and heart flutters. “I attended rehearsals intermittently on an IV drip, and being readmitted at night.” She skips forward several years, and young Jessica has become part of the girl group Soul Deep while studying at the performing arts school. “I signed my initial contract, and I had a cerebral event. Then when I was planning to release songs in the year 2020 I had a car crash and my voice box shifted and I couldn’t sing for a twelve months.”
Oi, I say, hold on, I can’t keep up. At just 17? She nods|agrees
